


The Only Constants

by MaxKowarth



Series: Sisters Of the Unexplained [4]
Category: Doctor Who & Related Fandoms, The Omega Factor (TV), UNIT: the New Series (Big Finish Audio)
Genre: Background Character Death, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, F/F, Grief/Mourning, Science Fiction, Supernatural Elements, Useless Lesbians, Women Being Awesome, implied ghosts
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-12
Updated: 2020-07-17
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:28:26
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 4,485
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25226098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaxKowarth/pseuds/MaxKowarth
Summary: Dr Anne Reynolds makes a discovery in the course of her work that makes her alert her girlfriends.Can UNIT help solve the haunting, or will their presence make things worse?
Relationships: Kate Lethbridge-Stewart/Anne Reynolds (The Omega Factor), Kate Lethbridge-Stewart/Petronella Osgood, Kate Lethbridge-Stewart/Petronella Osgood/Anne Reynolds (The Omega Factor)
Series: Sisters Of the Unexplained [4]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1495040
Comments: 1





	1. Chapter 1

Doctor Anne Reynolds sighed as she removed her glasses and pinched at the bridge of her nose. She’d been in this situation many times before. Weeks of patient research, camera traps of increasing complexity over the years. 

Back in the 80s it was pure film. 16mm acetate and chunky tripwire operated cameras. Then hours in the onsite lab processing the film from all the cameras and trying to make sense of tiny artefacts in every frame.  
Then Video cameras made stills technology far easier but digital processing, despite the steep learning curve had been a god send.  
It was much harder to fool a digital signal with a warm sheet for example. Her students would laugh when she recounted the lengths people would go to in faking a haunting. 

She replaced her glasses and went back over the 50 frames one more time.  
It was impossible. Everything about the evidence suggested a genuine haunting, except one. The ‘ghost’ was not at all human.  
She dragged out her phone and hit the speed dial that had become increasingly obvious in the last hour.  
‘Kate Stewart’s phone?’

-  
Precisely 2 hours and 47 minutes late Kate Stewart was lent over Anne’s shoulder, scowling at the image on the screen.  
Anne did her level best not to settle back against the soft chest behind her, she was at work after all.  
‘You were right to call us. Even without the PRoBe directive this is very sensitive material.’ Kate growled next to Anne’s ear, forcing the older woman to bite her lip.

‘I thought it was a new blouse’ she quipped and was rewarded with a smile under the heavy rimmed glasses. ‘Is it one of yours?’ She half expected Kate to ask if she meant the blouse or not.  
‘Technically its one of Osgood’s’ Kate replied. The scientist in question started guiltily and stepped away from the rack of processing equipment at the mention of her name.

‘I... uh I…’ she drew on her inhaler and forced her breathing to slow before finishing her reply. ‘It does resemble a Zygon of the Brotonic caste. They have had a presence north of the border in the past but that was more Inverness way. I don’t recall any reports of them making it to Edinburgh, let alone dying here.’  
‘Dying?’ Kate raised an eyebrow at her. ‘Who said anything about dying?’  
‘It’ a ghost.’ Osgood replied as if that were a fact.  
‘Oh, well then there’s no need for us to be here at all, is there? We can leave it to Anne; she’s far more qualified to investigate than we are.’ Osgood’s face fell at Kate’s irritable sarcasm.

‘Why shouldn’t it be a ghost? Animals have ghosts.’  
Kate sighed. ‘Officially nothing has ghosts as UNIT doesn’t recognise the existence of the supernatural.’  
Anne laughed ‘officially neither does Department 7, would you believe? We are actually supposed to actively disprove them.’  
Osgood went back to studying the data Anne had been able to release to them. If they were just going to tease her she needn’t have come.  
‘Is that all you have?’ Kate asked, pocketing her glasses and moving back to the other side of the table. Anne sat up straight and pointed to the tablet Os was reading.

‘Reports started about 3 months ago. It took nearly a week to set up monitoring equipment and a further fortnight before we got any results. Temperature and pressure fluctuations at first then, this footage was taken Monday.’  
‘Why wait so long to call us?’  
‘Oh I didn’t, I’ve only just reached this in my review. It’s summer, no students to call on and the Department is back down to me and Raoul the janitor!’

Kate’s official face vanished into the concern of an adoring girlfriend. ‘Why didn’t you tell us? I could send someone to help.’  
‘That’s exactly why I didn’t tell you. Pride!’ Anne laughed and sat back once again. ‘It’s also why I’ve relied on the camera trap rather than a stakeout.’  
‘Aren’t they for vampires?’ Kate joked. Anne laughed. Osgood coughed. ‘What?’  
‘We are prepared for vampire’s ma’am, evidence from The Doctor in Sir Alistair’s time.’  
Kate rolled her eyes and looked to Anne who held up her hands ‘I haven’t heard anything.’

‘All the reports and sensor readings suggest a very specific time frame of between 11.30 and midnight down this alleyway.’ Osgood summarised as she handed back the tablet. ‘Can we get anyone on site this evening?’  
‘I can call in troop from Dolerite base if I need to. Otherwise you have Captain Carter at your disposal. Just keep him away from anywhere offering tourist kilts. I have enough memories of dads to last a lifetime.’  
‘And as 11.30 is some time away, allow me to host you all for dinner.’ Anne beamed. ‘7? That should give you some time to set up whatever you need. The department is at your disposal.’ She waved at the equipment Osgood had been examining and watched her face light up.


	2. Chapter 2

The team’s first move was to visit the alleyway in question. To Osgood’s surprise it was only a short walk from the bustle of Princes Street. 

‘So what is this building?’ Josh frowned as he aligned his mental map with the alleyway he stood in.  
‘We’re behind the Royal Company of Merchants, there’s a “Yo!” at the end around the corner. And the alley leads out onto Rose Street Lane. Turn right at the end and you’re on Hanover Street opposite the bank.’ Anne supplied as she sparked her vape into life.  
Osgood stepped away from the sickly smelling cloud and toward the camera mounted part way up the wall, making lighting calculations to place wherever the ghostly Zygon footage appeared.

Josh removed his beret and tucked it into his epaulette as he joined her. ‘Anything?’  
‘I’m not Spiderman, Josh. I don’t have a sixth sense about ghosts or Zygons.’  
‘I should have thought Zygons would be at least your 18th sense.’ He teased. She chose to ignore the comment.  
‘What are you doing in combat uniform anyway, going to challenge the ghost to an arm wrestle?’  
‘Oh no, this is public relations. Looks more official than two women and a cricket fan.’ He smoothed a crease from the shoulder of her jumper and she elbowed him in the ribs. ‘Honestly, why ask for me at all?’  
‘I suppose you won’t believe it’s for your comforting manly presence.’ Not a single thing in her reply inspired confidence and Josh just shook his head. ‘Truthfully, you’re the best control group we have, after Abbey Marston and Eeldon House.’

‘This can’t be Infrasound Osgood’ Kate interrupted. ‘Hallucinations from projected audio wouldn’t affect the cameras.’   
Os poked Josh again ‘You can be manly for Kate.’ She whispered.  
‘Anne, you’re the expert here. Have there been other ‘hauntings’ in the region?’  
‘In Edinburgh? Only in every hotel, B&B and pub in the city. Half of them will tell you Burke or Hare were regulars.’  
‘No, I mean specifically nearby.’ Kate was taking in the ancient buildings in their latest incarnation.  
‘There’s the drunken man. Reports of him have been around since at least the 70s. Even Tom Crane looked into him.’ Kate took Anne’s arm.  
‘Show me.’

-

Two right turns in less than a minute and Kate was looking down Hanover Street towards the Royal Scottish Academy.   
‘The sightings stretch from the middle of the street here right across the Gardens and usually peter out by Waverly station.’  
‘Why the drunken man?’ Kate interrogated.  
‘He’s described as staggering, reaching out blindly. All a bit Scooby Doo and we never really put much credence in the stories. Tom wasn't able to sense anything when he looked into it. Otherwise it's often unreliable witnesses at ridiculously early hours.’  
‘Early as in before 1 a.m.?’ Kate pondered. Osgood cleared her throat behind them, making them both jump.   
‘I can see what you’re thinking Kate, and I agree, for what it’s worth.’   
‘Good. See what you can do about confirming it. I’ll call in troop but do your best to keep it low key. Contact your side; see if they have anything to offer.’  
‘Ma’am’ Os nodded, already typing into her phone.  
‘Tell me I’m not going to regret calling you.’ Anne looked uncomfortable at the mentions of troops on the streets on Edinburgh.  
‘I’ll explain my theory, over dinner.’ Kate grinned and offered her arm once more.


	3. Chapter 3

Kate cooked, filing Anne’s rooms with the enticing scents of something far more exotic than Anne herself would usually bother with. It seemed to be a deflective tactic to avoid actually explaining the nature of her thoughts to her girlfriend. It was lovely to have her back in the rooms, even under the circumstances and Anne tried her level best not to interfere, with the cooking or with Kate’s clothes.  
Eventually she forced herself to leave the kitchen and put on some music until Kate called her back to the dining room.

‘There is no way the two of us are going to get through all this.’ Anne humphed at the bowls of food on the dining table.  
‘Not a problem. Some for Josh and Osgood and the dogs will polish off the rest.’ Kate grinned around her rice.  
‘Alright. What are you not telling me?’ Anne went directly to the point as she ate.  
‘The creature in your footage is a Zygon. They are shape shifters.’  
‘And you think the drunken man of Hanover Street is the same ghost as the Zygon?’ Anne finished.

‘The clincher is the timeline. The Zygon ghost appears between 11.30 and 12. The drunken man after that. If you were a scared alien life form trying to escape something step one would be to hide. Step two is the quickest route out.’  
‘Hence the drunken man making his way to the Station. I see the logic. But even if you’re relying on Stone Tape theory, which I hesitate to point out was made up by Nigel Kneale and no more reliable than levitation…’

‘Even if I do, these are events that have occurred sometime before 1980, if you and Tom looked into them.’  
‘So what is to be learned? What benefit is there in investigating?’  
‘Oh Anne, come on. What was it running from? Not Yo sushi, they weren’t there a decade ago, let alone 1980. And if it was in its natural form in the alley…’  
‘Was it alone?’ Anne put down her fork and stood, crossing to the lounge to hunt out an A to Z from her piles of paperwork in the book cases. She handed it to Kate as she returned to her seat. ‘1977, if it helps.’

‘Thanks.’ Kate put it to one side as she finished her meal. She looked across at Anne and tilted her head at the puzzled from she found there. ‘What?’  
‘Shouldn’t you tell Osgood?’

-

Josh clicked closed the newly arrived mobile command truck that was now blocking the alley from the Rose Street thoroughfare and joined Os at the far end of the alleyway. ‘Shouldn’t you tell Kate?’  
‘Not until the readings are more conclusive. Basically I’ve ruled out Zygon technologies but that means very little. They could be using Osmic projection technology stolen from the Sontarans, even a form of Vortex Manipulator if they’d been able to impersonate a time agent.’  
‘Bit of a rubbish one if all they get is a stretch of Edinburgh over and over. Don’t get me wrong, its lovely but even if you’re right and Zygon makes it to the station... it could be anywhere.’

‘We should ask Doctor Reynolds about haunted trains.’ Os agreed, even though that wasn’t Josh’s point. ‘There’s a lot written about ghost trains but that’s the ghosts of trains, not ghosts on trains.’  
‘I thought you were kidding when you said ghost busting was a hobby.’  
‘Remind me to introduce you to the UNIT work of Professor and Mrs Shaw sometime.’   
‘Expert was he?’  
‘She and she didn’t believe in ghosts, but there’s a lot you can’t explain.’  
‘She and Mrs? Oh, right.’ Josh shrugged and watched her for a little longer. ‘If its time travel, it’s pretty broken. Do we still have that Chronal frequency thing Kate built?’

‘At the power station? Wrong sort of broken, Josh, that was time itself fractured. This is more like a stuck record, playing over and again.’  
‘Like in the Stone tape?’ Osgood was surprised he had actually bothered to watch the DVD. Especially as he seemed far more interested in the ‘Ghostwatch’ DVD elsewhere in the set. Clearly Sarah Greene was more his type than Jane Asher. Unless it was Doctor Pascoe.  
‘Sort of. Although that was a future trauma impacting on a past event...Oh!’ Osgood’s eyes went wide and she searched her pocket for her phone. ‘Josh, I could kiss you.’ She announced and he was disappointed, but unsurprised, that she didn’t.  
‘We’ve been looking at ghosts as artefacts of the past. What if whatever this is, hasn’t happened yet?’  
‘You mean a foreshadowing, echoing backwards?’ Josh reached his comms and called Kate as Osgood contacted Zygon high command.


	4. Chapter 4

Kate examined the mass of electronics Osgood had put together before she returned, making adjustments as she clicked her tongue.  
Josh unzipped a pouch on the sleeve of his fatigues and fetched out his regulation cutlery, handing Os the fork while keeping the spoon for himself, to eat the Tupperware box of curry.

Anne pulled her shawl around her and rolled her eyes. She was beginning to regret calling in UNIT, this wasn’t how she did things. Techno babble and cables were all very well for impressing students but all this was leaving her behind. She decided to leave them too and went around the block to talk to the staff at the Yo.

At the top of the escalator the restaurant was fairly busy, for a Tuesday night. Couples lined the window seats and a bunch of lads by the centre counter seemed o be trying to drown out the ambient music with hip hop. Anne waited patiently, observing both the layout and the clientele. Perhaps one of the regulars had seen or heard something.  
‘Hello, Doctor Anne Reynolds,’ She flashed her ID at the terrified looking girl on the counter. ‘Has the night manager arrived yet?’  
Her only reply was a shriek of ‘PHIL’ met shortly by a nervous man with wiry grey hair.   
‘Hello, Phil, Is there somewhere I can have a quiet word?’ Anne charmed with her still proffered ID. He led the way to a desk by the fire door and graciously pulled out a seat for her to sit.  
‘How can I help Doctor Reynolds?’  
‘I’m with the team investigating the incident in the alley out back…’

-

Outside Kate gave the order to fire up Osgood’s device. Lights flickered, wires whirled and the alley was cast in a pale blue glow.  
‘No evidence of chronal displacement arriving ma’am’ Os called over the hum. ‘Seems to be some sort of disapparition field developing’  
Kate moved to her side to look at the readings.

-

‘Good you can tell them to get a bloody move on, blocking ma fire escape wi their big black van!’  
‘Oh, I can certainly tell you they will be packed up just as soon as we’ve found some answers.’ Anne soothed. ‘Now, what can you tell me about the incident?’  
‘Polieas have the CCTV.’ He beamed nervously.  
‘Oh yes. I’ve seen that and the footage from the night after. What I was wondering is could the fugitive have come through here?’ she pointed to the back door with its peeling quick release handle.

‘F… fugitive?’ Phil stammered. His eyes flicked between the counter and the fire door. Anne raised an eyebrow, intrigued that he should pick up on that part of her story rather than the potential of a run through the shop.  
‘Whoever it is, is clearly running away. You have seen the footage, not likely to run down your escalators, eh?’ She urged in a quiet, calm voice.  
‘Oh aye… he was definitely running’ Phil nodded.

‘Oh, you thought it was a male, on the run?’ Anne asked, still soft and reassured. Phil looked anything other than reassured.  
‘I... well... I... uh... ‘Phil gulped and leapt from the desk, dashing for the fire exit and launching himself off the stairs down into the alley.

-

Josh heard the crash of the door and drew his sidearm. The panicked night manager turned the corner and would have run toward them if he hadn’t been held in place by the blue glow emanating from the device. He roared in agonised panic, flickering as he forced himself forward.  
Osgood took a step toward him, one hand held out, almost as if to help him. Anne appeared behind him, calling his name.

Phil bent upward, his form bulging and splitting into his natural Zygon body. Engulfed in the blue glow his panic became inaudible.

Kate dashed to the machine and snatched the power cord away.

Phil ran onward, through the equipment, through the mobile command vehicle, his form flailing in and out of vision as much as it was reality.   
Anne dashed after him, taking a short cut to bring her out along Princes Street. She was familiar with the route of the drunken man and just as familiar with the centre of town. She could reach the station before the runaway alien.


	5. Chapter 5

Kate Stewart lost time calling for Captain Carter to stay with Osgood.  
Her girlfriend was clearly distraught that her device appeared to have been the very cause of the phenomenon that had brought them here.

By the time Kate reached Hanover Lane, Anne was nowhere to be seen. The Zygon however had reverted to his ‘Phil’ shape and was lumbering down the middle of the road, dodging tourists and vehicles alike.   
Kate knew she could easily catch up to him, even in her red kitten heels. But she knew enough about cause and effect to realise she wasn’t going to. Not before the station anyway. She followed the staggering figure as it played out the path of the drunken man, phoning back to her team as she went.

-

The concourse at Waverly station rang with the sound of booted feet.   
The night manager of the Yo, his grey hair even more dishevelled now that that he had returned to most of his disguise breathed heavily as he took in the arc of Transport police, the anti terror officers and the pair of soldiers seconded to UNIT. 

He looked down at his still Zygon left arm and knew there was no way he could bluff his way past. He wasn’t ready to test his recent incorporeal moment that allowed his escape across the town, not ready to believe that hot lead wouldn’t pass through him.

Between him and the raised weaponry stepped Dr Anne Reynolds. She held up her hands as she arrived and she smiled at him. There was no triumph in the smile, only concern. This wasn’t the face of a foe trying to capture him.  
Rather she seemed motherly, like a stranger who had found a child’s lost balloon. Her hands fell, reaching out to him.

‘Phil hello again. You’ve done nothing wrong. There was no need to run.’ Anne kept placating him in that soft, warm voice of hers, inching closer with every word. ‘I’m sorry if I startled you. It must have been a trying week for you. Did you recognise the figure on the CCTV perhaps? It doesn’t matter really. Listen, why don’t we start our conversation over?’

She was next to him by now and reached out to take his left hand, giving it a reassuring squeeze. He looked down at the grip and up into those vibrant blue eyes and the accompanying smile.  
‘Why don’t you and I pop up to the “The Booking Office” and finish our chat?’  
‘The pub?’ Phil frowned.  
‘I’m not having the coffee out the machine, and I don’t think you should either.’ Her smile broadened to a wide grin as she led him away.

-

Kate Stewart watched them go, slightly confused at the turn of events but equally proud of her girlfriend. She took charge of the armed response team and used her credentials to arrange an officer to stand by the pub doors, just in case Anne needed back up.

She was watching Anne and the Zygon sat at a table when Osgood caught up to her.  
‘What’s going on, why’s the pub still open?’  
‘I asked nicely.’ Kate removed the earpiece that she was monitoring the conversation with. ‘What happened.’  
‘I think our search for timeline disruption has just become a paradox, we’ve come here to investigate a phenomenon of our own creation.’  
‘Obviously, I meant with the Zygon?’  
‘The high council placed him as a local just after the treaty. He was in place without any particular issues for years. Lost their partner earlier in the year and went very quiet but they was nothing to have called them to the council’s attention.’

-

‘So, why did you run, I’m not that scary am I?’  
‘It was the badge. There was… ’ Phil put down his pint and stared at his now human hands. ‘I was in a crash, something stepped out in front of the car as I came to work, and I spun the wheel to avoid it and crashed. My partner didn’t make it. They said it was an accident but I… It was my fault. I was behind the wheel. I thought you had finally come to arrest me. I’d heard what they do to my kind in human prisons.’

‘I am so sorry for your loss Phil.’ Anne reached to take both his hands, breaking the memory of the steering wheel from his vision. ‘I was only trying to find the truth; I’m a scientist, at the university. A Ghostbuster, would you believe?’ She paused but the Phil didn’t rise to her charm or even lift his eyes from his hands.

‘In my line of work, I meet a lot of grieving people. Blame is a very common factor and almost always the least useful part of the grieving process. It was the first place I went to when I heard I had lost a very close friend. We hadn’t spoken in years but almost immediately my thoughts turned to guilt and blame. Questions like; why didn’t I call, what could I have done, is there anything I can still do?’

She tailed off, but Phil had no way of knowing about the face of Tom Crane that appeared as solid to her memory as his steering wheel had been to him. 

‘And you know what? There _is_ something we can all do, forgive. Forgive ourselves, the lost ones and our own guilt. None of us are here forever and none of us intend to leave such a hollow wake behind us. Were they a romantic partner?’ She asked diplomatically. Phil could only nod.

‘Oh, that is the very worst kind of grief. Love is like a mirror, our partners show us the very best of ourselves. How could they not when their love for us would otherwise make no sense. And when that mirror is lost we feel both the absence of their affection and the lack of reflection of our own. The world turns cold around us. But let me tell you this Phil.’

She squeezed his hands again, maintaining contact with him. ‘Love lives on. All powerful emotion does, stored up inside you on your partner’s behalf. And that’s the true measure of grief, going forward, finding new ways to show that love still exists. Don’t run from it, embrace it.’

-

Osgood finished reading her data file and bit her lip. Kate knew the expression too well as a cover for her not swearing.   
‘What?’  
‘The accident that killed his partner? He swerved to avoid the drunken man.’

Kate did not filter her swearing.


	6. epilogue

Phil was given an escort home by a police officer. Kate made sure not to bring up the information Osgood had brought to light until the pair of them had joined Anne at her flat.

The evening had taken its toll on them all. Each sat apart from the others, nursing a glass.  
Scotch for Kate and Anne, milk for Osgood.

‘You were talking to him about grief being a blaming thing.’ Kate broke the silence  
‘You were listening?’  
‘Comes with the job.’ Kate explained, almost apologetically. ‘You didn’t mention it after Dad died.’  
Osgood glanced warily at Anne only to find the same reassuring smile hadn’t wavered.  
‘Of course I didn’t. You would have recognised it yourself, you _are_ a genius. Besides I had much more important things to be doing.’  
‘Oh?’ Kate frowned. Anne set her glass aside and moved to bridge the space between Kate and Os.

‘I told Phil that love is a mirror, and grief is its absence. But there is more than one love. And look at us, more than three.’ She spread her arms and pulled them together to cuddle into her.  
‘Right now everyone involved tonight is blaming themselves for something.’  
‘Apart from Josh’ Interrupted Osgood.

Anne ignored the comment at took decisive action, leaning towards Osgood and kissing her softly. She felt the young scientist relax under her arm and patted her back. Then she turned her attention and kiss to Kate.  
Kate Stewart took longer to convince, or perhaps she was used to the tactic and was deliberately extending the length of the kiss. Either way, Anne kept the pressure on until Kate’s shoulders also relaxed.  
‘Why are you blaming yourself?’ Osgood asked when the kiss broke. Anne blinked at her.  
‘Because it’s all been my fault, perhaps?’

‘You weren’t to know he would run from you.’ Kate soothed.  
‘Before that, I called you in.’  
‘Predestination paradox,’ Osgood sighed ‘You had to call us in because that would make us use temporal scanning to find the truth and without it the image wouldn’t have been sent back in time for you to have witnessed it and called us at all.’  
‘Lots of words for telling me it’s a ghost I can’t report on and Poor Phil still gets to go home haunted by the death of his partner.’

‘Yeah, bit of a Kobyashi Maru.’ Osgood admitted.  
‘Star Trek’ explained Kate to Anne’s frown. ‘So Gordy tells me, it means a no win scenario.’  
‘But we did win. No one died. Well, no one else at least.’ Anne lent forward to retrieve and finish her drink. ‘Feels more like “The Caine Mutiny” to me, no one and everyone to blame.’  
‘I don’t think I know that one.’ Kate tempted fate. Anne grinned.  
‘Or would you prefer to take us both to bed?’ Osgood suggested


End file.
